Last night, with the Yankees up 6-4 and two outs in the ninth inning, Delmon Young hit a sinking line drive to right field that defensive replacement Greg Golson caught for the 27th and final out.
Except right field umpire Chris Guccione ruled that it was a trap, giving Young a single and giving the Twins a chance to tie the game with Jim Thome stepping to the plate.
Thome ended up popping out on the first pitch he saw from Rivera, so ultimately the blown call didn’t hurt the Yankees, but it very easily could have meant the difference in the game.
MLB.com has the video of the play and everyone’s reaction, if you missed it live.
This season has been a rough one for umpires and the fact that Guccione got the call wrong was particularly egregious because a) he was only on the field in the first place because MLB adds extra umpires for the postseason, and b) he was standing literally 20 feet from the play.I was sitting (or standing at that point, probably) on the opposite side of the field, so the fact that it looked like a catch to me in real time obviously doesn’t mean much, but I can say that the majority of the Twins fans at Target Field assumed it was a catch and everyone in my section reacted in sort of a sheepish “well, I’m not going to complain if they want to give the Twins an extra out” manner.
Golson put it perfectly after the game, saying: “I’m just glad the play didn’t end up being bigger than it was.” Unfortunately we can’t always count on that being the case.